NeoCitiesThrottles FCC Down to 28.8Kbps in Opposition of Proposed Net Neutrality Rules

NeoCities slows the FCC's Internet connection down to dial-up speeds

There's a lot of back and forth going on in regards to net neutrality and new rules proposed by Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chairman Tom Wheeler, who also happens to be a former lobbyist for cable and wireless companies. To show its opposition to the proposal, which is scheduled for a vote on May 15, 2014, web host NeoCities managed to throttle the FCC's connection to its website down to dial-up era speeds.

In a rather angrily written blog post, NeoCities creator Kyle Drake referred to Wheeler as the "bonehead responsible for this idiotic and insane proposal," and said "the FCC isn't doing their job of protecting American consumers." Rather than stop there, he neutered the FCC's connection and created "The Ferengi Plan," which for $1,000 per year he'll happily remove the 28.8kbps modem throttle.

"Since the FCC seems to have no problem with this idea, I've (through correspondence) gotten access to the FCC's internal IP block, and throttled all connections from the FCC to 28.8kbps modem speeds on the Neocities.org front site, and I'm not removing it until the FCC pays us for the bandwidth they've been wasting instead of doing their jobs protecting us from the 'keep America's internet slow and expensive forever' lobby," Drake wrote.

While this is likely to have limited effect, Drake went the extra mile by posting the throttling code they're using on GitHub. Game on, in other words.

"It's time for the web to organize and stand up against these thugs before they ruin everything that the web stands for," Drake said.

It would be nice if this spread to other and throttled not only the FCC, but all their employees too. I think 28.8K is too high how about 2.4k old school! I mean regulation is just text and 2.4k is plenty for text right.

To be effective, they need to throttle down the commissioners' personal connection speeds to the extent that they can. I suspect most of them don't care about either the government's effectiveness nor the impact on the public at large.

I fully expect that this comment will place me on the NSA monitoring list.

In addition violent international drug cartels operate with impunity. Spying by the NSA is not used to protect the public from external threats. The true purpose is to protect those in power from their victims, average citizens.

It should also be noted, one would not believe the volumes of data that the NSA has - more data in one agency than most people even know about themselves.

They are even financial number crunchers. Only a matter of time before NSA elects to share some of those financial numbers with agencies such as the IRS; as it would triple the number of IRS cases - overnight.

But then again it would also literally prove how many american companies (also individuals) are investing their money overseas. Makes one wonder for what reasons??

1. Most likely had their LIVE conversation intercepted at one point or another, especially if one ever happens to go outside of the countries border. Naturally this "so called" level extends to every person inside of the country borders.
2. Every person has a file. The size of that file is staggering. It is also time indexed. Find me one adult american who doe snot have at least one red flag in those files. Did I that even peaceful protest (as protected by federal law) is enough to get one red flagged in a major way?

So they pay attention to literally every adult american; even ones whom have never broken any laws at all - or even people who have a risk factor of zero. The conclusion; what has become the police state of america, a version far worse than the book 1984. Russia and North Korea could only dream of having a system such as the NSA

This topic began it's portrayal in the media as comcast dropping packets and slowing down netflix traffic to end users

If NETFLIX provides it's data to the comcast network at speeds fast enough that comcast "should" be able to distibute that data to it's end users at speeds which the end users paid for, then the problem is with comcast

Certain media outlets are now portraying Netfix as the problem by not providing the backbone delivery systems to the comcast network with the proper bandwidth and/or not willing to pay comcast the costs needed to deliver it's content at the proper speeds

The news outlets need to identify correctly if netfix is delivering its content to comcast at the proper speed it is paying Comcast to deliver that content to the end users at

If the new's outlets keep changing their story as to who caused the problem without finding where exactly the problem lies, then I arguing either side of this debate is pointless!

So, what about the nugget of truth that is in Comcast's argument about the costs that they incur to build special hardware to handle Netflix's tidal wave of data?

No matter what happens, we'll be the ones footing the bill for that. Netflix tried to hand-wave that cost away and it didn't fly and it came to this :(

Even if the quasi-NN status quo were to be maintained, what would stop Comcast from asserting its right to throttle data on the lines that it built w/o tax $, like the lines from their hardware to your router?

The wave is obviously coming from Netflix -> Comcast. The Netflixers who, out of masochism or desperation, use Netflix via Comcast created the wave but their requests for video are surely inconsequential vs the massive data wave that netflix is sending in response.

Five years ago, the FCC allowed cable companies to scramble Extended Basic channels. To continue watching ESPN, Comedy Central, etc, I would have to pony up another $9 per month - PER TELEVISION - and increasing my cable bill by 40%. And the descramblers would not allow me to use my HTPC to record any more. If I want an inferior DVR, the cost would go up further to $16 per month, per television.

So instead, I canceled Extended Basic and reduced Comcast's income by $25 per month from my household. I'll get by with watching just the broadcast networks and local independents, right?

Then last year the FCC allowed cable companies to scramble the Limited Basic channels, and Comcast executed that just one week before the NFL Pre-season games began.

So I bought an antenna.

For all the hate I have for Comcast, I hate the FCC even more for being their enablers. Stick it to 'em, NeoCities.

Slugbait said, "Then last year the FCC allowed cable companies to scramble the Limited Basic channels"

I don't any longer live in an area served by cable, so I guess this one slipped by my radar. I checked it out, and you're right. "The FCC reversed its decision under pressure from Comcast and other providers", says the Wiki page for QAM (television). Man, that's a rip. The level of corruption in the US government is disgusting.

I pay Comcast, or I pay Ceton. Or, I pay them both, plus rental fees on all but one cableCARD. Any way you look at it, I pay thru the nose. The antenna only cost me a hundred bucks, and it feeds all of my machines...I don't have to buy an antenna for each one.

The question is though, how will this affect the FCC? The code only affects the main Domain page not anything else, not even the webpages being hosted on Neocities.org are throttled, and how often does the FCC visit said page? My guess, not that much or that often, if at all.

The real power that this has is the potential, but others have to use the code to make it effective, otherwise nothing will happen.

Argue for net neutrality by being as anti-NN as possible, executing an extreme case of what no NN could result in. This attack of theirs seems pretty puerile.

Would it be as "epic" if ISPs started throttling connection speed to dial-up for other websites in order to prove a point? I mean, Amazon.com has a lot of weight to throw around, so we should throttle them to inspire them to fully commit to the fight. Same goes for the iTunes website. It is only a logical baby step away from what this company is doing to the FCC.

Going further down the rabbit hole: Since Comcast is anti-NN how about all other internet providers throttle all requests from Comcast to dial-up speeds? Those saps paying for Comcast's ISP service are just enabling them and they need to see the error of their ways!

Are you just stupid? They are doing what the FCC will be allowing if they get rid of NN. Yeah, let's get rid of it so people CAN do the exact bullshit you're talking in paragraph 2. It's NN that will keep them from doing it, when comcast inks a deal with Walmart, they can throttle amazon traffic now and no one can do anything because they no longer have to treat all data the same.